With land bank approved, officials eager to get to work

Voters have approved a constitutional amendment to create a land bank in the Adirondacks and Catskills that will aid localities in public works projects on state Forest Preserve land, including the replacement of the Middletown Bridge in Horicon, Warren County.

Photo by Christopher South

HORICON | Voters have approved a constitutional amendment to create a land bank in the Adirondacks and Catskills that will aid localities in public works projects on state Forest Preserve.

The effort capped off an aggressive push by a broad coalition of stakeholders, including local governments and environmental groups who agreed the amendment was necessary to expedite critical local infrastructure projects.

Horicon Supervisor Matt Simpson said he hoped work would now commence on the Middleton Bridge in Warren County, the shuttered structure that has become something of a poster child for the amendment.

Progress to build a new structure across the Schroon River has been at a standstill because using the 20 feet of state-owned land on either side would have required amending the state constitution.

A detour has stymied residents and added valuable minutes to emergency response times, including to a ranch fire just days before last week’s election.

“Our next step is to work with the county to bring this back to the federal improvement bridge program and get it in the queue for funding,” Simpson said.

Supporters of Proposal 3 were skittish that union-led opposition against a constitutional convention would torpedo the other ballot proposals.

That did not turn out to be the case.

While Proposal 1 was handed a resounding loss — and a measure to bar officials convicted of a crime of their state pensions easily passed — returns for the land bank were a nail-biter, with “no” votes leading the charge until late-night returns from the Adirondacks put the proposal over the top, carving out a modest 4 percent victory.

About 11 percent of New Yorkers left the ballot blank.

Owing to the complex, years-long process of crafting the amendment, the state legislature has already passed enabling legislation for how the new law will be carried out and is awaiting the governor’s signature.

“Both sides agreed ahead of time what the enabling legislation would say,” said John Sheehan, a spokesman for the Adirondack Council, an environmental group that rallied voters statewide to approve the amendment.

The state will purchase 250 acres of land to add to the state Forest Preserve: 150 in the Adirondacks, and 100 in the Catskills.

Local governments will now be authorized to purchase small slices of acreage at fair market value from the account under a process administered by the state Department of Environmental Conservation with legislative oversight.

The state will then replace the acreage through the land bank elsewhere.

“It would be Forest Preserve added to the state’s holdings,” Sheehan said. “We just don’t know where. It depends on what’s available, and what’s next on the list.”

The amendment will also allow the installation of utility lines and bike paths along highway corridors that cross Forest Preserve.

Voters statewide approved the bank in all but eight counties, including by huge margins from the counties located in the Adirondack Park, including Essex and Hamilton counties, with 63 and 70 percent approval rates, respectively.

So did Orlean and Sullivan counties, where margins were razor-thin, with the proposal ultimately losing by less than one percentage point in each locality.

Stakeholders are still probing the tea leaves in an attempt to discern why the vote was so contentious.

“You had these narrow misses,” said Adirondack Association of Towns and Villages Chairman Bill Farber. “Obviously voters were looking at something, thinking about something and seeing something we hadn’t anticipated.”

Farber posited a lack of media coverage, negative attitudes towards the “con-con” and a lack of clarity on the ballot language may have led to the tight margins.

“I do think there was some confusion and spillover,” he said.

Adirondack Council Executive Director William Janeway said the vote was close statewide because perhaps the proposal was perceived by many as a weakening of New York’s “ironclad protections that keep the Forest Preserve of Adirondack and Catskill parks wild forever.”

“New Yorkers are hesitant to approve exceptions to the constitution’s Forever Wild clause, even for good purposes, and it didn’t help that this proposal doesn’t include a significant, net expansion and improvement to the Forest Preserve,” Janeway said in a statement.

Sheehan said the divisive results in Sullivan County — the measure fell short by 97 votes out of 13,821 cast — stemmed from the erroneous belief that the amendment would have allowed for the construction of pipelines in the Catskills.

“I think it was really a misunderstanding,” Sheehan said.

Voters approved a similar land bank in 1957 for the state Department of Transportation to use in straightening state highways.

Over the past 60 years, about half of those 400 acres have been used, according to the Adirondack Council.

“Six times in the past 22 years, the voters have approved amendments to the Forever Wild clause to accommodate large community projects that required a land swap involving five acres or more of Forest Preserve,” said the Council.

Larger projects will still require separate amendments.

Farber said he was optimistic some of the utility projects could see liftoff as soon as the vote is certified, including a water line replacement project in the Town of Fine in Hamilton County, as well as additional utility projects.

“Some of these projects we know about on hold can now move forward,” he said.

Protect the Adirondacks also endorsed the measure and campaigned for its approval.

“We’re confident that the new Health and Safety Land Account will be used responsibly and effectively by state and local leaders,” said Executive Director Peter Bauer in a statement. “We’re hopeful that this effort assists the development and viability of communities across the Adirondack and Catskills.”